S30.E14: It's A Fickle, Fickle Game / S30.E15: Worlds Apart Reunion

[Andromeda]

If they (or some subgroup of the -gag- Strong 6) had instead brought Mike back into the fold and made him feel more secure, even if they were lying -- or especially if they were lying -- then maybe once his back was no longer against the wall, he would have relaxed a bit and biffed a challenge. 

I think that's exactly what Jeff was getting at when he asked Mike about what drove him (and Mike at first answered Jesus.) Would Mike have so many immunities if he'd felt more comfortable and been in a majority alliance? They could easily have brought him in and then blind-sided him -- but that takes strategic thinking.

 

Why did CBS remove the Second Chance videos?! Now that I know who's in the cast, I want to watch them!

[iMonrey]

 

Jeff may say that Mike is a likable winner, but not by this fan. Will and Dan said so many atrocious things it's easier to forget what an ass Mike was in the beginning. I never ever warmed to the guy and every time they showed his happy dance I got more annoyed.

 

I, too, suspect Mike got an overly favorable edit, and that's because the producers knew there was nobody else to root for and at least Mike was an underdog, winning all those immunity challenges. But "rooting" for someone isn't the same as being asked "Which one of these deadly diseases would you like to see end mankind?" Uh, I guess Ebola? Seems like a less painful way to go than the other two choices. Doesn't mean I'm rooting for Ebola, or like Ebola, it just means it's the least contemptible choice.

 

This finale strengthened my belief the network and producers knew they had a real turkey on their hands this season that didn't merit a Sunday night slot. Not only did the FTC get the bum's rush but so did the reunion. They simply couldn't get this season out of the way fast enough to start promoting next season. 

 

 

As far as [Carolyn] not making the Second Chance vote, I think it's as Joe said.  She comes across as cold.  And she's not villainous enough to be interesting.

 

She was probably also hurt by staying in it so long most people assumed she'd wind up in the final three and wouldn't need a second chance. I know Mike got enough votes to come back but I think a far greater number of viewers figured he was a goner the minute he lost immunity and was a much bigger long-shot to make F3.

 

Despite Jeff's taking Dan to task during the reunion, the sheer amount of camera time given to Dan - even on the jury - makes me think the producers really find him entertaining and will have him back as soon as possible. No, show, Dan is not entertaining. He's repulsive and delusional and I don't find either of those things entertaining. Nor do I consider Rodney the "character" you seem to make him out to be. I don't want to see him back either. Sadly, I strongly suspect they'll be on future seasons. I won't be there though. Both have joined my "banned season" lists along with anyone named Hantz.

[Wings]

 

Nobody playing on Season 31 is any more a veteran than Shirin - wasn't it a requirement that you can't have played more than one season to eligible for Season 31?  I have no idea how Shirin's potential wealth will play into the season, but the idea that somehow they're "veterans" and she's not makes zero sense.

 

 

I didn't mean to suggest they were not on an even playing field.  Just using verbal shorthand instead of typing the "the returning castaways."   Yes, of course they are all vets who have only played once.  My mental auto correct was not working well.  :.)

[Chit Chat]

Jeff may say that Mike is a likable winner, but not by this fan. Will and Dan said so many atrocious things it's easier to forget what an ass Mike was in the beginning. I never ever warmed to the guy and every time they showed his happy dance I got more annoyed.

 

The beginning of the season seems so long ago to me that I've forgotten those early days of how Mike, or any of the rest of them were!  Well, except for Shirin & the naked guy.  That visual remains!  I warmed up to Mike the past few weeks.  He did try to warn Dan a few weeks ago that he was on the chopping block, but Dan didn't heed his advice and ignored the warning.  That's the one thing that really pissed me off whenever we'd see Dan rolling his eyes during TC's.  I thought that Mike played a good game and deserved the win.  I would've been okay with Carolyn winning too.  I am finding it more difficult to find players to root for though in each season of Survivor.  I'm not too happy about a Second Chance season, but what the hell, I'll probably get suckered in again.  

 

I did like Jennifer's speech to the jury in which she told them they were the most bitter people she's seen.  They were probably a real pain in the ass to listen to at Ponderosa.

[meep.meep]

I'm happy with MIke's win - I thought he showed a lot of strategy, played hard, and earned it.  I'm still not sure what he meant at the reunion about what happened at the auction.  I think if he'd kept the full $500 to grab the advantage after agreeing to the $20 for letters, that there would have been no way he would have won.  People would have taken him as a goat.

 

He never actually lied to anyone, which is really hard to do.  He did warn both Dan and Carolyn that they were targeted, and Carolyn listened while Dan chose to believe that he knew everything about everything, as usual.  So, too bad Dan!

 

I thought that directing people's votes so he could tell if they could be trusted was genius.  It never sent anyone home, but he could tell whether they were with him or not.

[needschocolate]

For the life of me, I can't understand Rodney's "logic" - he says that his vote for Sierra  proves he is honest/trustworthy/being real - but it really doesn't prove anything - voting for his buddy Will would prove something.  Just like Rodney saying that Mike kept everyone from getting their letters - but everyone got their letters -  it was only Mike himself that might not have gotten his letter, had he not changed his mind.  He gets annoyed with Caroline for not telling him she had an idol, but he voted for her - why should she feel that he was her ally.  

 

While I can't figure out his logic, I think I have figured out why he has turned out the way he has.  I think one night, about 26-27 years ago, his parents were lying in bed and had this conversation --

 

Rodney's mom: Rodney stuck a fork in the outlet today.

Rodney's dad: Again! That is the 3rd time this month.  

Mom: Fortunately, I had remembered to turn off all the non-essential circuit breakers before he got up this morning.  But we are switching to plastic utensils from now on.

Dad: I think we need to face it - our Rodney is rather stupid.

Mom: I know.  He''s not too coordinated either. But what can we do?

Dad: Well, if we want him to ever move out of our house, we are going to have to build up his confidence - you know, tell him how smart he is, and how good he is at things.  Hopefully, he will believe us.  

 

And that is what they did.  Praise him for everything.  Catered to his every desire.  Made a big fuss over him.  Told him that "C": stood for "Complete", "D" for "Delightful", and "F" for "Flawless"  When Rodney misused words, they didn't correct him, they just started using the words the way he used them (Although, it was awkward for his father, who had to tell everyone he was a stamp collectiver).  

 

Their plan worked - Rodney was never smart enough to figure out they were lying.  And he grew up to think that anything he said was true, even if there was nothing to back it up and that his brithday should be like a national holiday.

 

When he was in high school, Rodney came home one evening and said to his mother "Bro, none of the chicks will have sex with me." and his mother told him that the girls have high standards. Rodney somehow interpreted that as a compliment, to himself.  

 

A vote from Rodney is like a negative vote, in terms of displaying intelligence and character.

 

I am not saying Rodney thought about this, but his voting for Will made Will and Caroline tie for second and, I believe, they both collect the second place prize - $100,000.

 

Rodney has shown himself to be such a bumbling doofus in challenges, I was seriously worried that he was either going to cut his fingers off or catch his face on fire.  I was also worried that Will was going to have a heart attack going up those stairs at the challenge.  Irritating as these people can be, I don't want to watch them die.

 

Why were his knuckles so raw - did he hit them instead of the flint.  Perhaps it was his blood that put out any sparks.  

 

Off-topic, but...   I respectfully disagree.  A percentage is simply another way of writing a fraction with a denominator of 100. For example, 16% = 16/100. Just as you can have an improper fraction (a fraction whose numerator is greater than the denominator), such as 4/3, you can also have what might be called an "improper percentage" like 120% or 300%...or 150,000%.

 

Thank you for saving me a lot of typing. Percentages can be more than 100%, in certain circumstances (House price goes from $100,000 to $500,000 in 10 years, you can say the price rose 400%).  However, someone still should explain to Will and Mike that for many thing, 100% is as high as you can go - if you are 100% sure, then you are a sure as you can be, if you are 100% right, you are as right as you can be.  

 

Note to Tyler: A person isn't paranoid if everyone is really against them.  

 

I have heard that they try to pick people with really high IQs and people with really low ones.  I think they may have forgotten to pick the high IQs this time around - or maybe they were all voted out early.    

[90PercentGravity]

I am not saying Rodney thought about this, but his voting for Will made Will and Caroline tie for second and, I believe, they both collect the second place prize - $100,000.

 

Maybe Survivor is different, but in most competitions that involve prize money, if two people tie for second, then the prize money for second and third is combined and split evenly between them, which means they both end up with a little less than the second place prize money (i.e. if second is $100,000 and third is $50,000, they would split $150,000 and each end up with $75,000).

[fishcakes]

Maybe Survivor is different, but in most competitions that involve prize money, if two people tie for second, then the prize money for second and third is combined and split evenly between them, which means they both end up with a little less than the second place prize money (i.e. if second is $100,000 and third is $50,000, they would split $150,000 and each end up with $75,000).

 

They do it this way on Survivor too. Dawn confirmed it after her second season, saying she and Sherri (who both got zero votes to Cochran's clean sweep) split the second- and third-place prizes of $100K and $85K and each got $92,500.

[Miss Scarlet]

 

I just didn't think it made any sense in light of her big "Mike is the best player!" speech. I even entertained the idea that she was fucking with people.

Both her and Hali gave Rodney a lot of props in their exit interviews, so I don't think she was messing around with people or she was drunk. I think she meant it. And even though I hate Rodney, everyone played a pretty bad game this season, but he played a slightly less horrible one. He was surprisingly skilled (ugh, I hate myself for even typing that) at forming the big alliance and keeping them together by intentionally vilifying Mike.

 

As for Mike, I could do without the religious speechifying. I mean, I'm sure it goes over well with most of Survivor's core audience, but I don't care for it. And just saying "it was God's doing" isn't a very satisfying or descriptive answer to questions about why someone won.

 

In terms of him as a winner, I don't think he's a great one. I really don't get this cascade of "the right person won!" and "he played an amazing game!". I get that people like an underdog, but he put himself in the underdog position with poor gameplay. And my opinion has always been that if you have to rely on winning multiple immunity challenges to win the game because your social and strategic games are poor then you are not a good Survivor player. You may be a good athlete or good at puzzles, but you're not good at the game. It's the same reason why I could never get behind Ozzy being a good player.

 

And yes, I get that a Mike win is more palatable to people than a Dan, Will or Rodney win because he's not as offensive, but I think people are conflating "inoffensive/nice person" and "underdog" with "good winner". There have been a lot of contestants that I disliked who won the game, but the fact that they were unlikeable to me didn't mean that they weren't the "best winner" or "the right person" because they did actually play the best game.

 

And frankly, I don't get the Mike love anyway and the white knighting of him. As many other posters have mentioned, Mike is only likeable next the Rodney, Will and Dan. He said some very sexist things that are extremely problematic. I think that when people look back in a few years at this season and have forgotten about how awful Mike's competition was, they'll see that Mike really wasn't that great either.

 

Maybe I'm off-base here since I haven't been watching the last few episodes and have only been reading about them online, but I do think Carolyn played just as good a game as Mike's. And I think that even though I don't like her and, more importantly, she got a pretty crappy edit. Imagine if she got the amount of screentime that Mike got. We would have really seen her game and she would probably look even more worthy. I think she was hampered by the fact that it's just harder for women (especially older women) to win this game and by the fact you had a jury where half of them were crazy misogynists and the other half decided they didn't like her because she flipped on them after the merge. It's the same reason they didn't like Kelly and decided to take her out with Jenn's idol. Hali confirmed in interviews that this wasn't a strategic decision. It was emotional and I think it was the same thing with Carolyn.

 

And I have to say that this bothers me a lot because you have a season where people are so indignant about the sexism (which is great), but then these same people turn around and analyze the game through an incredibly sexist lens. I'm talking about the players, as well as the fans, podcasters, etc. The editors and producers clearly were on the side of "Dan and Rodney are horrible sexist pricks who are going to get their comeuppance" and were able to see their misogyny as problematic, all while totally under-editing a lot of the women this season. And I get that some sexism is worse or more overt than other types of sexism, but for these people to criticize it while perpetuating a lot of it as well is very hypocritical.This has also come on RHAP, where Rob and Stephen would praise Tyler's game and say he was a potential winner, while discounting Sierra and Carolyn, who were basically playing the same game. I'm very glad that someone asked them about this in one of the voicemail segments and I understand their reasoning for it, but still. It's bothersome. 

 

I also don't get is all the Jeff love re: the reunion. Yes, he shut Dan down and that was great. But it was pretty obvious that he didn't do it because he cared about the misogyny (which he claimed on twitter that he cared about and would address at the reunion). He did it because Dan hurt his feelings by bad-mouthing the Survivor team and the editing. If Dan hadn't made those comments about the show, Jeff wouldn't have been hard on him at all. Jeff was his usual craptastic self when it came to the sexism on the show. And the whole thing is kind of funny to me too because the only reason that Jeff is so protective of this show is because this is his "thing" now that he knows he can't get other work in Hollywood. A couple years ago he thought he was going to go off and have a successful talk show and you could tell that he didn't care about Survivor that much.

Edited May 21, 2015 by wudpixie

[jzygayle]

I'm fine with Mike winning; I would have been fine with Carolyn winning.  I was a bit surprised Carolyn didn't get more votes, but then I realized she'd aligned with the men on the season who would NEVER have voted for a woman over a man.  She would have had to bring a woman's alliance to FTC in order to win.

 

I'm happy enough with S31's cast.  Shirin and Kass are the only castmembers that I didn't vote for.

Edited May 21, 2015 by jzygayle

[truelovekiss]

For the life of me, I can't understand Rodney's "logic" - he says that his vote for Sierra proves he is honest/trustworthy/being real - but it really doesn't prove anything - voting for his buddy Will would prove something. Just like Rodney saying that Mike kept everyone from getting their letters - but everyone got their letters - it was only Mike himself that might not have gotten his letter, had he not changed his mind. He gets annoyed with Caroline for not telling him she had an idol, but he voted for her - why should she feel that he was her ally.

While I can't figure out his logic, I think I have figured out why he has turned out the way he has. I think one night, about 26-27 years ago, his parents were lying in bed and had this conversation --

Rodney's mom: Rodney stuck a fork in the outlet today.

Rodney's dad: Again! That is the 3rd time this month.

Mom: Fortunately, I had remembered to turn off all the non-essential circuit breakers before he got up this morning. But we are switching to plastic utensils from now on.

Dad: I think we need to face it - our Rodney is rather stupid.

Mom: I know. He''s not too coordinated either. But what can we do?

Dad: Well, if we want him to ever move out of our house, we are going to have to build up his confidence - you know, tell him how smart he is, and how good he is at things. Hopefully, he will believe us.

And that is what they did. Praise him for everything. Catered to his every desire. Made a big fuss over him. Told him that "C": stood for "Complete", "D" for "Delightful", and "F" for "Flawless" When Rodney misused words, they didn't correct him, they just started using the words the way he used them (Although, it was awkward for his father, who had to tell everyone he was a stamp collectiver).

Their plan worked - Rodney was never smart enough to figure out they were lying. And he grew up to think that anything he said was true, even if there was nothing to back it up and that his brithday should be like a national holiday.

When he was in high school, Rodney came home one evening and said to his mother "Bro, none of the chicks will have sex with me." and his mother told him that the girls have high standards. Rodney somehow interpreted that as a compliment, to himself.

I am not saying Rodney thought about this, but his voting for Will made Will and Caroline tie for second and, I believe, they both collect the second place prize - $100,000.

Why were his knuckles so raw - did he hit them instead of the flint. Perhaps it was his blood that put out any sparks.

Thank you for saving me a lot of typing. Percentages can be more than 100%, in certain circumstances (House price goes from $100,000 to $500,000 in 10 years, you can say the price rose 400%). However, someone still should explain to Will and Mike that for many thing, 100% is as high as you can go - if you are 100% sure, then you are a sure as you can be, if you are 100% right, you are as right as you can be.

Note to Tyler: A person isn't paranoid if everyone is really against them.

I have heard that they try to pick people with really high IQs and people with really low ones. I think they may have forgotten to pick the high IQs this time around - or maybe they were all voted out early.

Can I just say, I giggled like a fool at the conversation between Rodney's parents. I really am curious about some of these contestants' families, especially Dan's wife.

[iMonrey]

 

I'm still not sure what he meant at the reunion about what happened at the auction.

 

Mike was trying to have his cake and eat it too. His point seemed to be that he regretted going back on the decision to keep his money and take the immunity advantage; yet he also regretted going back on his word to Dan about spending the money for the letter and staying even with everyone. That's kind of a contradictory statement which may be why you aren't sure what he meant.

 

 

Note to Tyler: A person isn't paranoid if everyone is really against them.

 

You know, as soon as someone brought up his "social game" it seemed to me a very simple thing to explain (even to these dummies) that once he knew he was the main target of his own alliance, he had to start playing a defensive game. And a defensive game does not really lend itself to a social game, when the only thing anyone else wants from you is to be gone. How social could he be, if everyone is openly ostracizing him, going off in their own little group and leaving him behind? But Mike wasn't really able to articulate any of this because they don't exactly cast brainiacs on this show.

 

That said, the fact that people kept bringing up his social game and Will's reference to him bossing everyone around demonstrates that his bossiness did not stop after the first few weeks - it just got edited out. Mike hasn't gone around complaining he got a lousy edit because he got a great edit. I wish someone else would have complained to the press what a favorable edit Mike got and how it made him look a whole lot nicer than he really was, but then Probst isn't about to pull out raw footage validating that accusation.

[90PercentGravity]

Mike was trying to have his cake and eat it too. His point seemed to be that he regretted going back on the decision to keep his money and take the immunity advantage; yet he also regretted going back on his word to Dan about spending the money for the letter and staying even with everyone. That's kind of a contradictory statement which may be why you aren't sure what he meant.

I think his point was that he ultimately didn't do the crime, but he still did the time. So, he wishes he would have either followed through or not started it at all. The way he did it, he ended up being on the outs with everyone and never got the benefit. That said, it seemed like what really split him off from the group was when he went after Rodney later when everyone was trying to read their letters.

[Andromeda]

As for Mike, I could do without the religious speechifying. I mean, I'm sure it goes over well with most of Survivor's core audience, but I don't care for it. And just saying "it was God's doing" isn't a very satisfying or descriptive answer to questions about why someone won.

You and me, both. Besides, are we to now believe that God loves Mike bestest of all the contestants, or because he asked God the nicest to make sure he won? Uh....right.

 

That said, the fact that people kept bringing up his social game and Will's reference to him bossing everyone around demonstrates that his bossiness did not stop after the first few weeks - it just got edited out. Mike hasn't gone around complaining he got a lousy edit because he got a great edit. I wish someone else would have complained to the press what a favorable edit Mike got and how it made him look a whole lot nicer than he really was, but then Probst isn't about to pull out raw footage validating that accusation.

I'm glad Mike won -- would have been OK with Carolyn too, and I agree, Mike got a great edit. I remember disliking him immensely in the beginning because of his bossiness, the way he pushed people to do what he thought they should be doing, his hogging of challenges and general sense that he could do anything better thn the rest (maybe that was so, but it sure didn't help his social game). Oh, and the Jesus bothering some, but I've seen much worse on this show.

Edited May 22, 2015 by Andromeda

[JudyObscure]

The likelihood of CBS demonizing an Evangelical Christian to lionize a Muslim, is laughable.

And yet, almost every season of Big Brother has a raving lunatic Christian in the cast edited to look as ridiculous as possible.  The one year they had a Muslim (Kazar) he definitely had a hero edit and was always  treated with respect when he prayed on his prayer rug ( unlike the Christian woman whose "taste Jesus" prayers were aired for all to laugh at.) The Buddhists they had in the cast when Jun won were also edited well.  Survivor has had plenty of the loud, "Praise Jesus!" people making everyone join hands and pray and I never felt they were edited  positively by the show. They were pushy and made to look pushy. I seem to remember a very foolish young Christian man confessing all sorts of strategy to Boston Rob and getting Andrea in trouble at the same time.  I wouldn't say the Christians on the show have been demonized, but ones like Brandon Hantz and the woman who refused to go into the Buddhist Temple were certainly made to look silly.

[ToastnBacon]

I liked Rodney's jury question to Will, "What did you do to keep it real?"

As if "keeping it real" actually means anything.

I also liked Shirin sniffing the marker before she voted.

[ToastnBacon]

I kind of liked Mike, I don't think he acted so bad.

That said, this season was pretty lame, and I don't think it was very surprising that Mike was able to win so many challenges against this batch of players.

[90PercentGravity]

I think this season was a protracted ad for CrossFit.

[Guest]

I'm happy with MIke's win - I thought he showed a lot of strategy, played hard, and earned it.  I'm still not sure what he meant at the reunion about what happened at the auction.  I think if he'd kept the full $500 to grab the advantage after agreeing to the $20 for letters, that there would have been no way he would have won.  People would have taken him as a goat.

 

He never actually lied to anyone, which is really hard to do.  He did warn both Dan and Carolyn that they were targeted, and Carolyn listened while Dan chose to believe that he knew everything about everything, as usual.  So, too bad Dan!

 

I thought that directing people's votes so he could tell if they could be trusted was genius.  It never sent anyone home, but he could tell whether they were with him or not.

I feel like if Mike had won the advantage it would've had the same effect on him as it did on Dan-- putting a target on his back.  

 

I wonder if Mike back-pedaled on that decision partly because of the reaction of Jeff.

[ljenkins782]

That reunion was even more poorly timed than I could have guessed. They wrapped up the current season at 10:40. and a solid 5 minutes or more of that was spent on Dan of all people. I'm pretty sure Jeff didn't even do a final "Congratulations to the winner" tag at the end. 

 

Much as I liked Jeff taking Dan to task, it took way too much time and honestly went a little over the top. I hate to even say that since I couldn't stand Dan, but I really thought Jeff went overboard with the "do you have a problem with women" stuff and trying to point out how he may come across wrong to people. Show that he's an ass, show that he's a liar with his "your momma jokes were flying" press comments and move it along. It's not an asshole intervention, it's a Survivor finale. 

 

In contrast, I felt like Will got off easy and I really disliked Jeff's dismissiveness toward Shirin. If the point of all this was to address the sexism and other issues, why so aggressively cut off the woman who tries to say that she would like to raise awareness of said issues? Yes, Shirin talks a lot but if you had that much time to grind Dan's face into the ground, you could give her 30 seconds or so and let her finish a sentence. Also, trying to force her to accept Will's apology was tacky, she clearly wasn't ready to do that and being all "well, he said he was sorry, so what's your problem?" didn't help.

 

As for Shirin, she kept winning me over and then losing me. Her animal kingdom analogies were pretty spot on and she stuck it to Will very satisfyingly, but then had to shove a Sue Hawk quote in there when it it didn't even make sense. Snakes eat rats, but sting rays don't eat howler monkeys and vice versa. And the random Jonathan Penner quote in the midst of the Will stuff at the reunion was really odd. Made her sound like she literally has nothing in her head outside of Survivor trivia.  I'm not sure I'm eager to see her again so soon. 

 

The whole FTC was a little tamer than expected, particularly Rodney and Dan. I have to give credit to Mike for playing Dan absolutely perfectly, right down to call him "Dann-o" (seemingly a nod to their previously close friendship). He not only apologized, but made it seem like the relationship was truly important to him, whether or not it actually was. 

 

Joe was slightly meaner (though not actually mean at all, just mean seeming for HIM) and I laughed at the irony of him calling out Mike for "just winning challenges." A. Mike did more than that in the early days when he was running the show and B. that describes Joe's gameplay exactly. Winning challenges was literally the only thing he did and as soon as he lost one, he was gone.

 

The show itself was pretty interesting, I didn't see that fire challenge coming and that was risky play from Mike. I was actually hoping Carolyn would lose it, that seemed like best case scenario for Mike. He'd have her vote locked up AND not have to worry about her taking votes at FTC. Apparently, based on his interview with Malcolm, he was more afraid of Rodney at FTC. 

 

The loved ones challenge seemed very rushed and impersonal and it was weird to have it so late in the game. I did enjoy the scenes with Mike's mom (curious about that though, didn't he say earlier that he didn't have parents? Is he adopted as well?) and felt very sorry for him when he was describing how he was treated, like that people would literally just not speak to him for days. I have to give him credit for keeping it together under those circumstances, you really couldn't tell that things were that bad and he always seemed to be positive toward them whenever they would throw him a bone socially. She seemed like a sweet lady and I loved it when she plunked herself down in the water fully clothed and lounged there chatting with Mike. Also can't believe she survived him diving full force onto her from the stage at the reunion! I saw Sierra's dad crouching behind her trying to catch them if they fell. Ha! 

 

I actually did enjoy this season a lot and am very happy with the outcome. I really wish they could have had their own reunion and done this second chance stuff another time, I can't believe that only 5 or 6 people got to even say a word at the reunion. Definitely an all-time low.

 

 

[allboys]

So this season has the accomplishment of making me doubt Survivor's editing more than any other. I'm convinced now that Survivor is a classist and racist show and that Dan and Will are its victims. Both of those individuals were portrayed negatively in light of Shirin (who I mistakenly sympathized with due to the racist and classist editing of the show). Turns out, Shirin is a white person who earned millions in her twenties. She is a Yahoo executive. Nobody seemed to like her while there. Since she's a corporate executive, that's to be expected. She probably is intolerable.

White corporate (millionaire) executive Shirin accused Will, an African-American man, of lying about his bringing back all the food he won as a secret reward (which he had honestly admittedly to receiving and honestly brought back). Will understandably overreacted upon hearing about the rich white executive's accusations that he was stealing from the all-white (except him) tribe. Survivor portrayed Will, the black man, as the evil one. Survivor's editing portraying Shirin as the victim of the black man's aggression. That decision was racist. This is not to say that Will was not a goat or should have won. It is to say that Survivor should be boycotted by anybody that cares about racism.

Then Dan. I felt Dan came across in the reunion as credible. He frankly admitted that his comments about "slapping" Shirin were inappropriate. As he should. Shirin never admitted that a white millionaire falsely accusing a black man of stealing from the all-white tribe was inappropriate. That is to her and Survivor's shame. I can understand how a blue collar man like Dan wouldn't get along with an elitist like Shirin and might be provoked to say extreme things about her. We were not shown how a corporate executive like Shirin managed to annoy every single person on the island to hell. Why is that?

 

 

 

 

I don't recall anyone accusing Will of stealing from the group.  They said he probably held some back for himself.  I think that is a very different thing.  I think other people had been accused of the same thing early in the season.  I thought they sounded like entitled jerks at the time, when Will was doing a nice thing, but Survivor isn't the real world.

Of course the show was classist-that kind of seemed like the point of the groups of "collars".

Did anyone know Shirin was rich before she said it last night?  I agree she was probably annoying but you just can't talk to people the way Will did.

[OldWiseOne]

I didn't understand why they voted Sierra off over Carolyn.  Was Sierra that much more of a physical threat?  I didn't understand that, because that's what Mike seemed to imply.  And, quite honestly, I think she would have tanked her final TC.  I couldn't see the jury voting for her, when her game was basically riding coattails.

Carolyn won more immunities, which is why I think Will and Rodney wanted to keep her in the hopes that Carolyn would win the final immunity so they could vote Mike off.

[Miss Scarlet]

 

In contrast, I felt like Will got off easy and I really disliked Jeff's dismissiveness toward Shirin. If the point of all this was to address the sexism and other issues, why so aggressively cut off the woman who tries to say that she would like to raise awareness of said issues? Yes, Shirin talks a lot but if you had that much time to grind Dan's face into the ground, you could give her 30 seconds or so and let her finish a sentence. Also, trying to force her to accept Will's apology was tacky, she clearly wasn't ready to do that and being all "well, he said he was sorry, so what's your problem?" didn't help.

I agree and that's what showed me that Probst didn't really care about addressing the sexism this season. He wanted to attack Dan because Dan had criticized the show and his edit in his exit interviews. Probst did it under the guise of addressing the season's misogyny, probably because he knew that would appeal to fans, but it wasn't what he was actually doing at all. If he wanted to address the sexism, he would have called out Mike and Rodney too. But Jeff doesn't really care about that stuff and is a sexist jerk himself, which is why I said throughout the season that he was not the right person to address this.

[North of Eden]

Just watched.

 

God, ugh, just ugh. Mike can go choke on his scorpion from the early episode in the season. The past month or so of episodes just wilted under him always winning everything and there being no opportunity to derail the season ending in his triumph. Mama C got robbed because she truly did play the better game without an immunity run.

 

Jenn was and always will be the suckiest suck that ever sucked....and pompous and arrogant to boot. Her pontificating to the jury was ridiculous.

Good on Rodney for staying true to Will to the end with his vote.

 

The Reunion:

 

Tough to say who go screwed more. This cast or the cast where they woudn't let most of them on stage because "the stage wasn't big enough" yeah, right...Brandon Hantz had nothing to with the incredible shrinking stage. Giving over half the show to deifying past contestants who many I can barely remember was just egregious.

 

On top of all that Dan...who I intensly dislike...totally was thrown under the bus in a way that racist Aryn Gries on BIG BROTHER never was. Julie Chen didn't even go to the clips and let her off in about two minutes. Dan meanwhile got (If I may quote Jackie Gleason's Sherriff in Cannonball Run) got his ass barbequed in mollasses by Jeff Probst. That was merciless. I didn't like it.

 

I wish we could have heard what Will's wife was shouting. Sharin...what can I say...people are fickle. Back when she was weirdly running around naked except for a bra comments about her were overwhelming negative. Then the incident happened and suddenly she got a lot of support in the comments. I feel ambivalent about her...I think Will was trying to be sincere but she didn't have it in her to  be the better person and accept. I hope we don't spend all next season with her story arc being a fixation on what went down with will. Let's hope she and SURVIVOR don't go there.

 

Jeff pimping out Joe was one of the grossest moments on any Reunion show. Yeah, he's a good looking guy but not a great player.

 

Rodney looked like he aged 20 years from the time on the island.

[pennben]

 

I did enjoy the scenes with Mike's mom

 

Mike's mom was great!  I felt so bad for her when she felt like she failed to help Mike with that immunity advantage.  What a thing to live with after having to leave with no resolution. In one of the interviews I read from Mike today, apparently she was still upset when he got home.  I was glad that he said he told her immediately that he won that challenge convincingly.

 

I too was worried we were going to need "medical" to intervene in the finale when he nearly ran over her!

Edited May 22, 2015 by pennben

[SnideAsides]

I don't get why they didn't reveal the new cast by having Jeff pull their names out of an urn.

[Lantern7]

Good point, SnideAsides. I suspect he wanted to do it like Ryan Seacrest to rub in the impending cancellation of American Idol.

 

Thinking about it, I should emphasize with Dan. Sometimes, I say (or post) stuff that gets blown out of proportion. But I think it's an unwillingness to look at oneself that separates me from him. Also, the facial hair. I shave twice a week because mine drives me nuts. Dan actually looks like a goat, and he acts like one as well. Tom Buchannan watches at home, unable to decide whether he'd want to eat Dan or copulate with him.

[thejuicer]

The entire time I watched the highlights (lowlights?) of Dan/Rodney/Will I kept thinking what two-time winner Sandra Diaz-Twine would have done with them. Those idiots got off too easy.

[kikaha]

The entire time I watched the highlights (lowlights?) of Dan/Rodney/Will I kept thinking what two-time winner Sandra Diaz-Twine would have done with them. Those idiots got off too easy.

 

Sandra said in an interview what she would have done.  She said if Shirin had been a friend, in her alliance, she would have defended her.  Otherwise Sandra would not have said anything.  And that's pretty much what actually happened during the season. 

 

Sandra did not think the Will/Shirin incident was a big deal.  She said things like it happen every season. 

[pfk505]

Apparently most people on here would like a cast of nothing but Sierras and Joes (oh and Shirinses!) for the foreseeable future.  People who say "problematic" things should be banned from winning, or even participating from here on out.  Welcome to the future!

 

Sandra did not think the Will/Shirin incident was a big deal.  She said things like it happen every season. 

 

That's because it does!  It happens in all walks of life.  It's not some kind of epic event.  It's what the Survivor producers decided to base their entire season around and people bought it so, so hard.

[NutMeg]

Late to the party because I still follow the old (TWOP) mantra of reading all the posts before posting (still a long way to go before I can post on Mad Men's last episode thread...).
 
So I've been reading it all, plussing the ones that made sense to me, or the ones that replied to other posts in a way I felt good with. I've also saved a few posts (from the last page only) that I wanted to reply to, as a warm up :-)
 

I think his point was that he [Mike] ultimately didn't do the crime, but he still did the time. So, he wishes he would have either followed through or not started it at all. The way he did it, he ended up being on the outs with everyone and never got the benefit. That said, it seemed like what really split him off from the group was when he went after Rodney later when everyone was trying to read their letters.

Love the "didn't do the crime but still did the time" part! Still, I think he was already split from the group way before then, and his going after Rodney was just used as an excuse - a "moral" excuse - by the others to justify an ostracizing that had been on for a while. That theory explains why Mike was so convinced he HAD to find the HII or he was toast - at the time, that made no sense to be; in retrospect, I wish the editors had shown us what really started the schism.
 
 

I feel like if Mike had won the advantage it would've had the same effect on him as it did on Dan-- putting a target on his back.

No shit. First of all, Mike already had a target on his back; also, I'm sure he would have found a way to leverage the double vote much sooner and with much more positive impact that Dan did - think fireworks instead of the dud we got. 
 

Jen potentially voting for Rodney is puzzling. I remember her being impressed by his impressions, but nothing else. Were they really that good?

Not sure why she said that, but in my opinion, and despite his execution, Rodney had the best strategy and the one least depending on chance/random elements, etc. : at the merge, and even though he was or appeared to be in strong with his tribe, he pulled people from other tribes who could have been swing votes and were not in a strong position by themselves, and promised them F4. And from then on he stayed loyal to them, while still (for a while) pretending to be with his initial tribe. he went on honoring his promise. That to me was pure genius because 1) no one in his former alliance saw it coming; 2) he could count on the others to vote out his former tribemates when the time came, without blood on his hand; 3) apart from Carolyn/Tyler, which wasn't his initial choice, all of them had him as their main alliance mate; 4) this strategy diddn't depend on winning challenges (Mike's) or having a HII as a backup (Carolyn) but was all his own doing. sure, Mike's challenge prowess and Carolyn's HII, and these two teaming up for a while, ended up costing Rodney, but I still stay that on paper his strategy was the one with the most chance of success. Then again, one of the beauty of Survivor is that what makes sense and what happens are often not the same thing, but still, somewhere in that big entitled baby/man, there is a solid strategist :-)

It was hilarious how every time he'd go back to the center marker to check the pointer, he'd then do a squat lunge in that direction before heading out.

Was I the only one reminded of Buzz Lightyear? (in Toy Story 1)

 

And while we're on so-called kid stuff, did any one else see the resemblance between Carolyn and Thea Stilton (sister of Geronimo Stilton)?

 

Also, in random order:

 

- Seeing his wife seemed to have reminded Will that she's going to see his (physical) prowess on TV. Better late that never, he then thought. Alas, lack of practice quickly put to rest that never-seen-before energy (and I loved Jeff's "Will's first, and that's a first").

 

- Will's wife on the reunion? Well, let's say these two obviously deserve each other. Hopefully they are very happy together and never again venture on my TV.

 

- Love how Eric, that most non fans have long forgotten, started a tradition of addressing the jury rather than merely asking questions of the final 2/3. Despite some random guy's best intentions in another season, I'd say Jenn's speech has been the best since Eric's [who's argument was "vote for Nathalie, not Russel", for those who don't remember or never saw the season].   

 

- Shirie: "dead fish" was spot on (nice of the editors to help with the visual); I also like her praising Mike as a person, on moral terms, but still establishing a distinction between being a good person and deserving to win Survivor - basically, he's a person that she's tremendously grateful to, but that in itself would not and should not be enough to give him the win if someone else proves to have had more gameplay. Very nice distinction to make, whether or not she was intending (as I think) to vote for him all along. I also liked her casually mentionning that she made her first million at 25 but that what Mike did for her meant way more to her - it killed a little part of Dan's and Will's self-serving conviction that "she's a loser and always will be". Suddenly, not according to her criterias, but according to theirs, they look like the losers here. Poetic justice! 

 

[For those who'll wonder what I know of Dan's and Will's criterias: nothing. What I saw on my TV is that they pick on the one they think is the most fragile/broken/about to break/outsider. I may be wrong, but I doubt that either of them would have behaved that way if they had known she was 1) way more successful in her job than they would ever had thought; 2) way richer than them, and from a relatively young age, and all on her own merits; 3) not the poor famewhore wannabe they took her for, and that they were!! (what I mean is, yes, she's a fan, but she doesn't need to be on Survivor to give meaning to her life, whereas for Dan Survivor seemed to have been the Holy Grail and as for Will, who knows, dead fish are not easy to understand)]

 

Back to Shirin, and shallow: I'm amazed at how she can go from looking goofy, even unattractive, to positively gorgeous, such as at some points during the reunion, and then start the cycle again. In a way it makes her endearing because it's like she couldn't care less about what she looks like.

 

Still shallow: Joe AND Woo - Christmas will come early this year for this viewer! Not so shallow: Joe had excellent insights and reflexion at Ponderosa and I think both him and Woo are people that I would like in real life. While Woo was not shown as a mastermind in the game, he always seemed nice enough, and after this season I'd take a tribe of nice people just having fun and enjoying themselves over unpleasant geniouses. That's how much this season has changed me.

 

Never had any problem with Carolyn and actually liked her gameplay from the start, but with so many people finding her smug and so many (maybe different) people extatic that Spencer is coming back, I have to confess that he, for me, defines smug - pursed lips, irratated expression on his face, never a smile, never a genuine nice word for anyone. Hopefully, he's matured a bit, otherwise I'll be rooting against him from the get go.  

[marys1000]

I'm so glad Mike won! YAY! Rarely does my fav actually win.
I loved that he got that Rodney was a jury threat (even if I don't quite understand that there were enough post boot interviews that clearly indicated that people thought Rodney was playing a good game) and thought a fire challenge would go his way with a Carolyn win and be very Survivor drama and fun regardless.

Not only that but I think he thought it was fitting that Rodney wouldn't be able to make fire because he was lazy around camp and it was his way of getting that little dig in about it.  Which was sort of funny.  Although of course Rodney did wash some dishes on his birthday. 

 

Mike was thinking right to the end. And when Joe said, no BS, own it or I'm done with you - he heard that so when someone said do you understand that people didn't like you - he didn't quibble or try to explain - just said he would work on it. I think he played and tried hard right from the get go and never let up. A deserving winner.

I didn't particularly like him at first with the religion, barking orders but I recognized that he was playing hard right from the start and I liked that and turned around fairly early.  I think the bit with the trying to make people work around camp must have remained an issue from Tylers? and Wills comments.  Any continued fighting about work was mostly edited out of course.

 

Its ironic that the reasons that Carolyn got to the end, idol and strong alliance, also hurt her chances at FC.  It didn't seem like she had done much because she hadn't had to.  But she made the right decisions in all the right places and I give her a lot of credit for that.  Good in challenges too.  I think the right person won but she was a close second. 

 

 

I actually really hated the personal drama - all of it but mostly the comments on the forums and boards and the attention paid at the Reunion.  The show is what it is.  We had Russell and we had Colton and  a score of other sexists and bigots of one kind or another.   Lindsay said she would rip off Mike's jaw and feed it to him and no one blinked. Half of my enjoyment of Survivor is seeing people discuss it on forums. And yes its fun to exclaim over things people do - like that was a terrible thing to say or wow that was a crazy thing to do. But I hate all the gleeful enjoyable hate directed at the people themselves, the assigning the lastest pyschological fad diagnosis and not just the action in the moment (Evil really?  Like Hitler you mean? Or just like Jeffrey Dahlmer).  Much of it way worse than anything Dan or Will said and we've never even met them! So if they are assholes, people trashing them on line are bigger ones. It may be true but (1) we can't KNOW that and and I do believe in editing if not outright close to rigging (Cochran's second season anyone?) on Survivor.  And people in real life can act mean and not be truly mean. I'm pretty sure that applies to all of us.   In real life if I respond with meanness that makes ME an asshole.  Same online.  And it just went on and on and on. Having 70% of the posts nothing but "he's deranged" he's an asshole" "he's pyschopath" is  boring  and I wish the moderator's would limit it somehow.

If, as some people have said that Mike got a favorable edit then regardless of any clip shown at Reunion - you believe that editing is real.  So it is still possible that Dan was shown in a (more) unfavorable light than he really was in those 39 days regardless of that reunion clip. 

 

I think Survivor stepped  over the line in going after Dan because he complained about his edit. I didn't enjoy watching that exercise in corporate intimidation.

Russell completely spoiled his season in clear violation of the contract AND THEY BROUGHT HIM BACK.

I think Surivor is edited  if not outright close to rigged sometimes and I take what is said and done on the show with a HUGE grain of salt.  And that clip was pure intimidation tactics.  If you're gonna go after every Survivor that does something awful or underhanded you'd better do it all the time (Colton's faking a medical problem and on and on) , which I won't enjoy regardless of the "crime".  I may dislike what I saw of Dan, I believe I've met his type (as portrayed) out in the real world and they aren't my favorite people, but that doesn't mean I enjoy seeing him just trashed regardless of whether it as deserved or not. Same for Will. Its mean and ugly and I'm not that kind of person.  If you say it, you are it.

 

Season 31:  Ugh.  Cochran is back.....er I mean Shirin.  Aren't they sort of the same?  They gave Cochran his own season to win, I feel like Shirin making S31 is lather, rinse, repeat.  I would rather see what Carolyn could do. 

Edited May 22, 2015 by marys1000

[phlebas]

As for Mike, I could do without the religious speechifying. I mean, I'm sure it goes over well with most of Survivor's core audience, but I don't care for it. And just saying "it was God's doing" isn't a very satisfying or descriptive answer to questions about why someone won.

Generally I feel the same way, whether it's a Survivor winner, football player, or cancer survivor.

 

However, in this case -- Will (who is just as religious, at least in his mind) is getting a constant reminder that God liked Mike more.  So I'm good with it.

[Alapaki]

For the life of me, I can't understand Rodney's "logic" - he says that his vote for Sierra  proves he is honest/trustworthy/being real - but it really doesn't prove anything - voting for his buddy Will would prove something.  Just like Rodney saying that Mike kept everyone from getting their letters - but everyone got their letters -  it was only Mike himself that might not have gotten his letter, had he not changed his mind.  He gets annoyed with Caroline for not telling him she had an idol, but he voted for her - why should she feel that he was her ally.

 

 

I'll defend Rodney on the first two points:

 

1.  I don't think he was saying that he was "being real" or "honest" in voting against Sierra himself.  I think he was saying that he was going to "be real" and "be honest" with Mike by explaining that Sierra would be a more formidable FTC opponent than Carolyn.  Whether he was accurate or not and, if so, whether Mike would've needed to hear it from a doofus like Rodney is another question.  But I get was he was saying there.

 

2.  Rodney's jagging about Mike "keeping everyone from getting their letters" was good gameplay.  At that point Rodney knew that Mike had discovered his secret alliance with Carolyn/Tyler/Will.  Rather than give Mike the opportunity to convince Sierra and Dan of that secret alliance (and the fact that they were therefore numbers 5 and 6) he turned the table and made Mike's conduct at the auction the focus of attention.

 

Finally, I'll agree that being upset at Carolyn for hiding her HII is like Rodney Dangerfield yelling at Judge Smails for scratching his boat in Caddyshack.

 

I'm still not sure what he meant at the reunion about what happened at the auction.

 

Mike was trying to have his cake and eat it too. His point seemed to be that he regretted going back on the decision to keep his money and take the immunity advantage; yet he also regretted going back on his word to Dan about spending the money for the letter and staying even with everyone. That's kind of a contradictory statement which may be why you aren't sure what he meant.

 

 

I think Mike was standing by the idea that getting the advantage for himself was smart gameplay because he had discovered Mike's plan to vote him out.  At the same time, though, the way he tried to execute that plan completely cut off any chance of keeping Dan and Sierra on his side.  There was no way to un-shit the bed at that point.  And Dan (or maybe Tyler, too) did ask him point blank whether he was planning on backing out when he pulled the "after you . . . no, after you . . . " ridiculousness.  

 

Not sure why she said that, but in my opinion, and despite his execution, Rodney had the best strategy and the one least depending on chance/random elements, etc.

 

 

I agree.  I've advocated the strength of Rodney's strategy all season (his glaring personality/morality flaws notwithstanding).  I'm not shocked that Jenn and Hali would vote for Rodney.  I am a little surprised that they would vote for Rodney over Mike, though.  For all the genius of his secret alliance, he committed a huge unforced error by trying to make a move against Mike while there were still a couple of easy votes left.  When Mike overhead that scheming, if he'd have played it better and not completely botched the auction, things might've gone very differently.

 

Ultimately, I regret that this was one of the most substance/strategy free FTCs and Reunions ever.  I get that most of the FTC is edited out, and maybe there weren't any real strategy questions.  But I think there are some important questions to be answered.

[Skeeter22]

I think the whole anti-Mike alliance made a huge mistake when they decided to ostracize him. He said they would sometimes go a whole day without speaking to him. If they had treated him better and pretended to consider working with him, he might have let his guard down and whiffed a challenge.

It was bad social and strategic play and it cost them all the game.

I thought Carolyn really showed a better understanding of the game when she realized at the end that befriending Mike would help her game. He has said one of the reasons he forced a tie was because he felt loyal to her in those last days. I think Carolyn's game was just too subtle for a lot of the jury to appreciate.

[NutMeg]

FTC was very bizarre this season. Not only were opening and closing statements edited out (that is, assuming they did happen), but for the jury members who had questions these questions and the answers were very randomly edited, in that the whole process seemed not to make a lot of sense. So far my theory is that they wanted to give away as little as possible/make us think that Mike had no chance in hell of winning, and because I knew he would win the second he won the last IC this was just complete dissonance. It's too bad, because for once I wouldn't have minded to hear more. Wonder if someone was almost totally ignored, if most questions were for X or Y, etc.

[Bryce Lynch]

Regarding 150,000%, yes you can have a 150,000% increase or 150,000% more of something, but you can't be 150,000% right or give a 150,000% effort or be for somebody 150,000%. I believe that is how it was used by the contestants, though I am only 149,000% sure.

[Special K]

FTC was very bizarre this season. Not only were opening and closing statements edited out (that is, assuming they did happen), but for the jury members who had questions these questions and the answers were very randomly edited, in that the whole process seemed not to make a lot of sense. So far my theory is that they wanted to give away as little as possible/make us think that Mike had no chance in hell of winning, and because I knew he would win the second he won the last IC this was just complete dissonance. It's too bad, because for once I wouldn't have minded to hear more. Wonder if someone was almost totally ignored, if most questions were for X or Y, etc.

 

I agree.  For me, the opening statements/closing statements by the finalists are fascinating and important.  They demonstrate who know what they were doing out there, who is deluded, who maybe just blindly stumbled along to the end, who got goated.  They also, I think, are super-important in showing who can walk that important line with the jury of promoting/owning up to their own play while being sufficiently humble, not blaming and not gloating while also not seeming to pander.  It's a tricky tone to get right, and you have to know whom you're talking to and what is important to each of them. 

 

I hate that it was edited out.  Maybe all three of them stank so bad, they thought they'd spare us.  Or maybe our winner stank, and they didn't want to disrupt the hero narrative.

[peachmangosteen]

I'm fairly sure they haven't been showing closing statements for a couple seasons. Whether it's because they don't do them anymore or they edit them out, I don't know. I hope this isn't the start of a trend of them not doing/editing out opening statements. Although I actually think if they're just gonna do one it makes more sense to do closing statements.

Edited May 22, 2015 by peachmangosteen

[suedehead]

What I'm getting from most of the post show interviews confirms the obvious: The editing tells the story they want to tell. Not saying Dan isn't a douche or Shirin's not annoying, but post production definitely did not care for some of these folks. Most of these contestants spoke of how much fun they had together, how they felt like family and that all were serious players. This didn't sound fake. They were disappointed the funny, joking around moments weren't shown because there were plenty. Sierra commented that she's such an loudmouth IRL that it was interesting to be be seen as "the quiet one." Every single person has said the person playing the hardest, smartest game was Rodney. Yes, Rodney. They also talked about how funny he was and enjoyable to be around. He stated some of his antics shown were game play, but came across as him being an asshole (it was a Satellite radio interview). MIke said that had Rodney made the final three, there was a good chance that he would have won. Sure didn't get that from the show. Mike also said that he wasn't surprised Carolyn only got one vote. He didn't want to elaborate, but said it wasn't a surprise. Both he and Rodney sounded more articulate than they did on the show.

 

 

I'm a Chicagoan transplanted to Georgia. I'm familiar with the species, too. The "Merica" thing makes me insane, and I'm always a little skeptical about Texans. But Mike grew on me - slowly.

 

Yeah, the Merica thing drives me nuts also,  but I'm a Georgian with a bunch of transplanted midwesterners living near me. I was skeptical of you guys also, but y'all (yes, y'all) grew on me slowly.

 

Except for the pizza. Too much sauce. NY style all day long!!!!!

[peachmangosteen]

I think the editing is definitely at play in the whole 'the payers think this season was great vs. the audience hated it' situation, but I also think these guys are maybe remembering stuff a little differently than reality. We know for a fact Dan is, so it's easy for me to believe that many of them might be doing the same.

Edited May 22, 2015 by peachmangosteen

[Bouffe]

I'm pretty sure the rest of the group knew that they could go back to the middle to get their direction. They were all probably allowed to get a general look of the setup and they all began in the middle.  I don't think they would not tell all the rest that there is a directional helper in the middle. 

Of course the rest of the group knew about the directional station. I clearly remember Jeff mentioning it during the challenge. However, Mike's advantage helped him navigate the maze a lot better and faster than the other members. I don't think we were shown any other tribe member using the directional station. Granted they all only got one medallion but... 

[Bouffe]

Agreed on the extra flint, and I was rooting for Carolyn to beat Rodney.  You broke the flint? Deal with it.  Of course, since they both wound up breaking their flint I guess it evened out.  And giving them a new flint is better than going to matches, I guess.  Although with these two that might not have been enough.

Malcolm did some interviews with Mike, Carolyn, Sierra and Rodney after the show. Rodney's revealed that he too thought Carolyn shouldn't have gotten a second flint. He pointed out that in the previous fire challenge at tribal, one of the girls (can't remember names) ran out of matches and the producers didn't get them anymore. He had a point - I too think based on that, Carolyn shouldn't have gotten a new flint. Rodney also says when he asked for a second flint, he received Carolyn's broken one LOL Don't know if that's true but if it is, it's kinda funny!

[Bouffe]

Jen potentially voting for Rodney is puzzling. I remember her being impressed by his impressions, but nothing else. Were they really that good?

Mike mentionne in a post show interview with Malcom that he didn't want to take Rodney to FTC because he had humour, and that when you are stuck on an island with not much to do, away from friends and family, humour goes a long way. I think aside from a few derogatory comments towards women, Rodney was well liked but his fellow tribe members. I do not understand why Jenn would have voted for him tho, that doesn't make sense.

[Calamity Jane]

Well, this certainly was a polarizing group of contestants!  From what we had to root for, I'm okay with Mike winning.  Carolyn or Rodney would have been OK, too, despite how much I just couldn't stand Rodney overall as portrayed.  Obviously he was playing hard, but his plans did keep getting derailed, and it was just so much fun to watch him process it each time.  I hope he doesn't think he can play poker because he was pretty easy to read when things went south.  But he had the most thought-out strategy of any of them.  If only he'd had some skill in challenges, either mental or physical.  He just stank at them all.

 

As for Will and Dan, I believe they have a lot left to learn about human behavior and how their words and actions affect people.  Every human goofs up and says or does things that shouldn't have been said or done, it's part of our nature. Most people learn somewhere along the way to own it and apologize sincerely, and then most people will forgive and let it go.  When you double down, defend, fake apologize, put it back on your target -- that's when people don't let it go.  And telling people they need to forgive you is also not a route to forgiveness, sad to say, at least for me - it just makes me angry.  You don't get to tell me when I'm ready to do that. 

 

Clearly, people are very divided on all the above, and I can appreciate that mileage always varies.  :-)  I guess that makes it a memorable season just for that.  But I'm hoping for something better next time!

Edited May 22, 2015 by Calamity Jane

[Bouffe]

This from Jonathan last night.  Can I just say, I would never, ever get tired of having him back.

Here, here! Love Penner.

[fishcakes]

Not saying Dan isn't a douche or Shirin's not annoying, but post production definitely did not care for some of these folks. Most of these contestants spoke of how much fun they had together, how they felt like family and that all were serious players.

 

If anything, I think editing did most of them a huge favor. Obviously, Will and Dan came off terribly (and rightfully so), but my guess is that the rest of them were much more unpleasant than shown, and I thought they were already pretty unpleasant. I don't doubt that the alliance of six had a lot of fun together, but that doesn't mean they're nice people. I was struck by Mike telling his mom that there was a two-day period where no one spoke to him so that must have been after Shirin was voted out and he was left alone with them. These are supposed to be adults and they think it's okay to ostracize another person. It might be only Will who lost his shit with Shirin, but everyone else except for Mike and Jenn were fine with that because she was the preferred target. Once she was gone and it was only Mike, he became the target, not only in a game sense, but socially. They froze him out and didn't speak to him because they're children and bullies but each of them far too cowardly to treat him as aggressively as Shirin was treated; all together in a group, however, they thought it was cool to just ignore him and let him know they thought he wasn't good enough to associate with. Sandra has said, "oh this happens every season," but it doesn't. Yes, fights happen every season, but organized, concerted efforts by a group of people to break down another person do not. There were shades of it during One World against Christina and at Gabon's Ponderosa against Crystal -- and those were bad enough in and of themselves -- but they didn't come close to what happened this season.

 

So the fact that six horrible people loved each other and had fun together and felt like a family means nothing, except I guess it proves the adage that water seeks its own level, and this is a level that includes Dan and Will. Based on post-game social media, it seems that Sierra has made amends with Mike and Shirin, but that doesn't mean her behavior in the game was okay. I seriously hope none of Will, Dan, Rodney, Tyler, Carolyn, or Sierra ever get an invitation to return because being a crapweasel shouldn't be rewarded.

[ProfCrash]

Malcolm did some interviews with Mike, Carolyn, Sierra and Rodney after the show. Rodney's revealed that he too thought Carolyn shouldn't have gotten a second flint. He pointed out that in the previous fire challenge at tribal, one of the girls (can't remember names) ran out of matches and the producers didn't get them anymore. He had a point - I too think based on that, Carolyn shouldn't have gotten a new flint. Rodney also says when he asked for a second flint, he received Carolyn's broken one LOL Don't know if that's true but if it is, it's kinda funny!

Jeff said in his interview with Dalton Ross that the flint is different then matches. There is a possibility that the flint could have been damaged or defective and that is why it broke so they replace flint. If you run out of matches, that is on you.

 

I don't doubt that they had fun out there. Given that we saw Dan's delusions, Joaquin's comments, Rodney's meathead comments, Shirin's awkwardness, Max/Shirin's Survivor geekiness I think we would have seen Will's bad behavior had there been more then the one fight. I think we saw Will in all h is glory. The Jury videos all reference Will not working around camp and sucking at challenges. We only saw the one fight so I think we can say that Will got along fine with everyone else and was a decent human being except to Shirin. The two do not like each other and they are not going to be friends. Got it. I don't think that the editing hid Will's fights or attacks on other players, I think he was a good person who had a very bad moment and said some awful things.

 

Tyler and Sierra have both said that they dialed back their personalities in the game because of all of the other big personalities. Carolyn said her kids reminded her as she was leaving for the game that she had to chill out. I think the three of them took the same path of under the radar play and got lost in the footage of Mike, Dan, and Shirin. Will was only prominent in the one episode because of the fight.

 

So I don't think editing hid a ton of additional bad behavior. I think people rubbed each other the wrong way and annoyed folks the same as every season. Obviously Dan and Shirin struggle in how they relate to others and that was a large focus of the season. I suspect that they had a really good time most of the time and that they do like each other. I know that Survivor rarely focuses on the cast enjoying each other and the under the radar play because it is not dramatic enough to make the Producers happy. So we saw the awful social play from Shirin, Dan, Mike, and Will. We saw the challenge prowess from Carolyn and Mike and the challenge disasters that were Will and Rodney. We saw the fights, the backstabbing, and the scheming.

 

It's just that the sexist comments and behavior seemed to be worse this season and it built. Vince with his stalker like behavior in the first few episodes, Dan to the women on his tribe, Rodney's comments to Lindsey, Mike and some of his comments, Joaquin and Shirin's exchange, then the Will/Shirin fight. There was an undercurrent of sexist behavior/comments that we see every season but from one or two people and with far less regularity then we did this season. It was strong enough that for once, it was evident to even casual viewers and became something that was discussed.

 

I feel sorry for Dan that he got hit with pretty much all of the backlash. He was plenty involved but he became the extreme example for the season. Vince was called on his treatment of Jenn when he left. Hell, Vince even called out the edit in the first episode but said the edit in the second episode was an accurate portrayal of him. Joaquin was asked about his attitude toward Shirin and made his Sierra has a nice ass comments in his interviews. Dan got the pent up emotion from the entire season and the Will/Shirin fight and decided he would punch back and wow did he take a beating.

[iMonrey]

 

Jeff pimping out Joe was one of the grossest moments on any Reunion show.

 

That's very much a Jeff Probst type of thing to do with one of the alpha males. It's a more polite way of saying "Boy I bet you're getting all kinds of tail now, huh?" That's what he's getting at, he just can't come out and say it on TV like he would if he were hanging out with his buddies at some bar. I also find it awkward whenever the host in any given reality show puts a contestant on the spot like that by asking if they're single. The contestant in question always seems to hesitate. It may be that Joe has been seeing someone but is technically still "single" so he doesn't really know how to answer without possibly angering whoever he's been seeing.

 

Personally I never thought Joe was all that. He has gorgeous hair, to be sure, but he looks silly (to me) when he puts it up in a bun, and his face, while not unattractive, is rather ordinary. They've certainly had far more handsome men on this show than Joe.

[Special K]

There is a man practically every single season who gets the "are you single" question from Probst.